This invention relates to a physiotherapy table.
People suffering from certain illnesses including cystic fibrosis, pneumonia, bronchitis and asthma sometimes require physiotherapy for the purpose of draining their lungs of mucus. Treatment is usually carried out with the patient in a half-sitting position, or lying prone on an inclined surface or ramp, head down, and in either position being pummelled with cupped hands to cause mucus to be dislodged from the walls of the lungs. Treatment of the patient in half-sitting position allows mucus in the upper lobes of the lungs to drain into the lower lobes, and subsequent treatment in the inclined prone position allows the mucus to drain from the lower lobes into the trachea from which it is expectorated by the patient.
Commonly, this type of physiotherapy is performed on severely affected patients for approximately an hour, three times daily, and mainly at home, although hospital physiotherapy staff also perform such treatments on interned patients.
For home treatment, it is usual for a ramp to be improvised, using a flat board covered with a blanket and supported on a domestic table by chocks to bring it to the required inclination. An improvised device of this nature has the disadvantages that the patient is not likely to be supported at a height convenient and comfortable to the physiotherapist who therefore is likely to develop backache during prolonged treatment; it cannot be adjusted to serve for treatment in other positions, particularly the half-sitting position; and if the patient is taken away from home, on a visit or holiday, the device is difficult and inconvenient to transport because of its length, and facilities for setting it up may not be readily available. Furthermore, it is found that patients, after prolonged treatment prone on a ramp are likely to develop severe headaches because of blood pressure consequent in the legs being kept raised; and with steep ramp angles the patient must be restrained, normally by shoulder stops which are uncomfortable.
In hospital treatment it is also common for treatment tables to be improvised, for although multi-positional tables are available in hospitals, these are very expensive and their use can usually be justified only in special areas such as operating theatres.
The present invention has been devised with the general object of providing a physiotherapy table which overcomes the present disadvantages, being readily adjustable to suit the requirements of the patient and the physiotherapist, and which may be readily transported.